


Financial Shenanigans

by slbc



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Gen, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-15 04:20:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28557519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slbc/pseuds/slbc
Summary: Armies don't feed themselves. Servants don't get hired for free. A story of an accountant in the Royal Palace.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	Financial Shenanigans

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wanderNavi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderNavi/gifts).



> A big thanks to wanderNavi for the idea. While its not exactly the 20k+ word fic requested, I think it is a really cool concept. I hope you enjoy.

Lee is a royal accountant, just like his father, and his father before him. As far as he can tell, being a royal accountant is like being a regular accountant, except with a lot more work. Like, a lot a lot. He still does it though.

The only reason he hasn't been fired is because the annual report would be a shoddy mess without him. He knows this because they tried firing his father once. His father then left to become a dumpling vendor. Nothing really seemed to change at the department, the monthly budget reports rolling in as normal. But by the time summer rolled around, no one had contributed to the annual report, and a scrambled, bare boned report was given to the minister of the treasury. Apparently, everyone had conveniently used their vacation time in the summer to run away from responsibility. Lee's family had always gone in the fall. After the pay cut given to everyone in the department, his father's formal boss reluctantly rehired him. Lee was grateful for this, as his family had eaten nothing but dumplings for months, and they weren't particularly good dumplings either. 

He isn't quite sure if he should keep this job, with how unbalanced the budget is getting. The department is twice the size it was in his father’s days.

They keep on hiring more and more people, mostly as favors for useless noble families for their useless noble children. They bring in more and more desks with less and less space available. Someone comes up with the brilliant idea of burning all paperwork filed before 20 years ago. It somehow gets approved, and Lee thinks it would be a shame for all of it to go to waste. After a late work night, he takes home the cabinet filled with old annual reports. Anything else would be too much, and someone would notice it missing. 

Over the next few weeks, he starts with the most recent reports, and goes backwards in time. The expenditures become cleaner, no miscellaneous use of funds, money clearly labeled for its purpose. By the time he no longer recognizes his father’s handwriting, the budget is clearly more streamlined as it was in the early stages of the war. As far as he can tell, the graft started to happen when the colonies were established.

The early days of the war are fascinating. Every section of the economy made profit. Farming, manufacturing, weapons development, everything. Taxes pour in across the board. Over time, this steady stream starts to diminish, only jumping after the initial looting of the colonies. Lee is then brought back to the present day, as taxes remain the same, and costs go up up up. 

Lee thinks back on his father and tries to remember why his father came back to the department. He can't remember. He tries to think of a reason to stay. Nothing comes to mind. 

The next day he tends his resignation letter. Of course the annual report isn't for another 9 months, so no one thinks anything of it. It’s simply an opening for another favor to be dealt. For Lee though, he is finally free, free to pick a new job. He could join a circus, or open a clothing shop, or a million things more. Free to become anything. Anything but a dumpling vendor that is.


End file.
